They Left Four Dying
by SUITELIFEFAN
Summary: It only seemed apt that their final adventure as a team of four would lead to them leaving an eternally condemned South Park. What better way to find out if you're a good team than to throw in hundreds of hungry, undead monsters into the mix? A Left 4 Dead / South Park crossover. Expect a lot of fear, bravery, and teenage angst.
1. Previews

**They Left Four Dying - Previews**

There was something wrong.

To state that something was "wrong" in the midst of the hell that had rained upon their little mountain town within 72 hours was moot, but the anomaly amidst the chaos in front of them stood out glaringly in Stan's sharp eyes. As he lowered his assault rifle to better identify the fresh new challenger that stood on the roof of the building a short distance away from them, a strong sense of trepidation arose in the depths of the adrenaline coursing through his veins.

"OI! STAN! WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING!"

The violent shout shook Stan out of his dumbfounded analysis. Cartman didn't pause his unbroken bursts of shotgun rounds despite his angry outburst, his trigger-happy fingers beating out slugs at the horde of infected at a constant, vehement rhythm. Standing directly behind him was Kenny, the hood of his orange parka off his head as he wielded the sniper rifle like he was born to brandish the weapon, firing alarmingly accurate shots and blowing up heads inthe seemingly endless horde that ran towards the group. Finally, there was Kyle. Sweet, wouldn't-hurt-a-fly Kyle who gripped on tightly to a duo of Glock pistols, a mortified look plastered on his face as though the pistols were burning his skin. He winced every time he saw one of the infected falling at his hands.

There didn't seem to be anyone else still alive in the whole of South Park.

Realising that a couple of infected were getting alarmingly close, Stan growled as he shoved the rifle outwards, pushing a group of three infected that had reached his front to the ground. Finishing two off with a shower of rounds, he drove his rifle butt downwards into the skull of the third, a satisfying squelch filling the air as the zombie's corrupted brains collapsed inwards.

Just as Stan was about to look upwards for the unknown infected again, something happened that made his blood run cold with fear and alarm.

The unusual zombie opened its mouth and whipped out a tongue that seemed far too long to fit in its mouth in the direction of the group of four. The fifth appendage traveled at such an alarming speed that Stan didn't have any time to react, the course of action hindered further by the absurdity of the zombie's attack. The tongue hit its mark and rapidly moved like a snake, wrapping around its target's torso and ensnarling his arms.

As his pistols fell from his now useless hands, Kyle screamed bloody murder as the zombie retracted its tongue, dragging him against the hard ground in its direction.

"WHAT THE FUCK!"

Stan's eyes were bulging out of their sockets.

"Shit! Kyle!"

Making a mad dash away from Cartman and Kenny, who were still fending off the horde of infected, Stan simultaneously raised his rifle in the direction of the mutated zombie, ready to put it out like a light. As he pushed firmly against the trigger, he heard a hollow 'click', the empty rifle's chamber echoing with morbid finality.

"Fuck…FUCK!"

The tongue was dragging Kyle away at a speed that was frighteningly fast, Stan's movement also hindered by the abundance of corpses strewn at his feet. Willing himself to run faster, Stan watched in horror as his super best friend arrived at the side of the building, the tongue now pressed against the edge of the roof and bent at a right angle. The zombie appeared to be trying to pull Kyle up the side of the building, but was failing in its attempt. Instead, Kyle was finding himself suspended in mid air, struggling to free himself from the appendage and finding it intensely difficult to breathe as the pressure of the tongue against his torso increased.

He looked at Stan with fearful eyes and choked out a plea.

"Stan…help…"

There was no way in hell Stan was going to let his super best friend die in front of his eyes.

Snatching the machete that he had picked up earlier and had strapped to his side, Stan picked up his pace and finally arrived at the side of the building, nearly tripping on his own feet. He then swiped the blade in a single arc above Kyle's head, the tongue giving way and sending Kyle crashing into the ground writhing in pain and shock.

A loud bang filled the air. The zombie then seemingly exploded in a puff of greenish smoke, leaving behind no corpse to be examined.

"What the fuck was that?"

Turning around, Stan's eyes met Cartman and Kenny, who had finished fighting off the attacking horde and were jogging in their direction. Kenny's sniper rifle was still smoking, and from the contented look on his face Stan could tell that his parka-clad friend was the one who had expertly killed the monster. Cartman was looking a tad out of breath after the attack, and his ammunition pouch looked significantly lighter than it had been before.

"No idea. Some kind of…mutant zombie."

"Great. Just…great."

Cartman then roughly prodded the shuddering heap at Stan's feet with the barrel of his shotgun. Kyle flinched at the sudden coolness of the barrel against his arm.

"Oi…what's up with jewboy?"

Stan blanched as he remembered that his friend had nearly just been suffocated. Kneeling down, Stan made quick work of unwrapping the severed tongue from Kyle's torso, trying his best to keep down his dinner as his hands made contact with the slimy chuck of muscle. Tossing the useless hunk of meat aside, he then tucked his arms under Kyle's armpits and gently hoisted him to his feet.

"Kyle…talk to me, man."

Kyle's face was deathly white and drenched in cold sweat. He attempted to respond to Stan, but only succeeded in a few incoherent mumbles, still obviously traumatised by the events that had occurred. Cartman grunted in impatience before stepping forward. Extending his palm, he made a motion that implied an incoming slap to Kyle's face, only to watch his favourite jew recoil and cower at his action, nearly collapsing back onto the ground if Stan had not been holding him from behind.

Cartman ignored the fiery glare that Stan was throwing in his direction and settled with walking back in the direction from which he had come.

"He's fine. He doesn't have a choice, anyway. We have to move."

As the four picked up the items they had dropped in their earlier skirmish, Kyle kept close to Stan, a decision that the latter observed and supported. He had always been protective of his super best friend.

Kyle picked up his pistols and wiped them off on his jacket before sheathing them.

"I really hate zombies."

* * *

><p>"See that zombie in front of us?"<p>

Kyle stared out of the window of the safehouse in the direction of Kenny's finger and nodded. The lone zombie was leaning against a wall motionlessly. With the apparent lack of fresh flesh and the silence of the mountain, there appeared to be very little reason for it to waste its precious energy on movement.

"Excellent. Now, take this."

Before he could protest, Kenny had shoved his hunting rifle into Kyle's unwilling hands. As Kyle shook his head vehemently, Kenny couldn't help but sigh.

"You've already killed so many, Kyle. I even saw you tear a pouncing one off Stan with your bare hands before bashing its brains out against a wall. What's the big deal?"

"The big deal, Kenny, is that I killed those out of necessity! They attacked us first, so I fought back! In case you've forgotten, Kenny, these...things that wander about aimlessly used to be like us!"

Swearing under his breath for letting his emotions get out of control, Kyle turned away from his friend to hide the tears that were pooling in his eyes. The events of the past few days had left Kyle Broflovski's mind an empty, emotionless shell. As his emotions bubbled to the surface for the first time since the start of the infection, Kenny couldn't help but let out a sigh of relief. He had been worried for Kyle's mental health, and he knew that a good cry could do wonders for a disturbed mind.

Gently taking the rifle from Kyle's trembling hands and resting its muzzle against the wall, Kenny then enveloped Kyle in his arms and pulled him closer against his chest. Gasping in surprise, Kyle looked up from his taller friend's orange parka into his clear blue eyes.

Kenny didn't need words to convey his message. His eyes did the talking for him.

For the first time in a long time, Kyle cried like a baby.

* * *

><p>"Fuck...that wailing."<p>

Stan cringed at Cartman's warning. His ears were picking up the confirmatory sound, and despite the fact that they hadn't seen any infected for a while, he knew that something absolutely terrible was coming up ahead. As the eerie and familiar cries filled the night air like a twisted siren song, Stan tightened his grip on his weapon and visually scanned the area.

The fog wasn't helping.

Kyle rested a hand on Stan's shoulder before looking back and forth between his three friends, an expression of resolution on his face.

"Let's not make the same mistake as the last time, guys. Flashlights off."

Grunting in affirmation, Cartman shut off the flashlight that he had taped to his shotgun. Kenny and Stan were quick to follow.

There was only one direction where they could navigate their way to the gas station in relative safety, and the guys were still inclined to take the shortest path. As opposed to walking along the road, Kenny had earlier suggested cutting through houses in a linear fashion, where they could scour for any supplies and weapons left behind by the dead. His idea had thus far been beneficial in that aspect, with the four finding fresh batches of ammunition and rations that would help them survive longer in the hostile environment.

Now, with the sound of the witch's cry ringing in the air, fresh doubts were planted in their heads.

Taking the lead, Cartman walked up the steps to the house directly in front of them as gently as his large mass could. Resting his hand on the doorknob, he looked back at his friends tentatively.

"You guys ready for this?"

For the first time, even Kenny looked afraid of what they might potentially face. Stan looked equally terrified. He had been the witch's first target during the last attack, after all, and he didn't want a repeat of those past events. Kyle, however, looked practically emotionless as he clutched his pistol and his molotov cocktail, a concoction that he had made out of a glass bottle, kerosene and an impromptu wick in the last house that they had been in.

"Ready as we'll ever be, I suppose."

Cartman gritted his teeth in anticipation.

"Alright, jewboy. Whatever you say."

As the door was slowly pushed open, Cartman couldn't help but notice that the wailing appeared to be getting louder. Squinting his eyes in the darkness, he took his first step into the house and whispered under his breath.

"I can hardly see a shit. You guys?"

"We're probably as blind as you are, Cartman."

"Stupid witch. Why couldn't she be startled by like...chocolate instead of light and sound?"

Satisfied by Stan's nervous chuckle from behind him, Cartman took a few more tentative steps in the house, allowing the trio more room to step inside. Nearly all of the light in the room was instantly extinguished the moment Kyle shut the front door, leaving everybody only about 3 feet of effective visual distance.

"I think we'd rather tread a little more carefully around this place rather than risk a horde storming in through the door, don't you think?"

As much as Cartman hated to admit it, the jew was right.

The guys slowly made their way up the stairs, Cartman taking the lead as usual, and Stan keeping his back to the group to fend off any potential attackers from behind. As the group neared a closed door, Cartman placed a finger on his lips to signal for absolute silence. Taking a deep breath, he turned the doorknob and pushed.

The witch, the female zombie with elongated fingers that were somewhat mutated into veritable claws, sat on the ground facing the window, which was wide open and provided a beam of moonlight that cast the witch in an eerie spotlight. The zombie was looking down at the ground, continuously weeping as if it had more to be sad about than the healthy that her fellow kind liked to hunt.

The moment Cartman spotted the she-devil, he reflexively raised his shotgun in the witch's direction, ready to fight. The only things that stopped him from firing instinctively was Kenny's anxious hand on his shotgun barrel, and Kyle's simultaneously terrified and furious demeanor as the shorter boy smacked him on the head and mouthed angry words to his arch nemesis.

_Don't even fucking try._

Kyle placed his hand on Cartman's upper arm and turned his head to signal to Stan to step backwards. As the group slowly made its way back into the corridor with extreme caution, the unthinkable happened.

Cartman stepped on a particularly weak floorboard. The creak sounded like it could have been heard from the adjacent house. The four gasped inwardly and froze, shooting their gazes in the direction of the witch.

She didn't appear to have heard them, her unbroken cries still piercing into the night.

Thanking his good fortunes, Cartman took a large step backwards, anxious to get out of the room as quickly as possible. He didn't realise that Kenny had yet to move himself.

As the larger boy bumped heavily into the smaller one, Kenny lost his balance and started a one-way collision course towards the floor. Stan, his sharp reflexes coming into play, stuck his arm out and wrapped it around Kenny's chest to halt his movement. Unexpected to everyone, however, was the continued movement of Kenny's sniper rifle as it slipped out his grip.

Their lives instantly flashed before their eyes as they watched the weapon fall, gravity pulling it mercilessly downwards.

The sniper rifle hit the ground, discharging a round harmlessly through the wall next to them. The greater concern, however, was the explosion of sound that followed the stray bullet, which, while usually already loud enough to wake a deep sleeper, seemed amplified by the enclosed walls of the suburban home.

The growl from the witch's throat was instantly recognizable.

She was angry.

A blood curdling shriek filled the air as the witch threw her head to the ceiling and wailed in fury. As she rapidly got to her feet and extended her lethal claws, Cartman felt his blood run cold.

"Holy fuck...RUN LIKE HELL!"

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note<strong> - This is a preview of my play on a left4dead and South Park crossover. I've always wondered how the four boys would interact in a zombie apocalypse situation, and thought I'd give my own spin on it. Depending on the response I get for these previews I'll decide whether or not I'll give a full story a try.

Reviews appreciated.


	2. Chapter 1

**They Left Four Dying - Chapter 1**

Stanley Marsh could feel his heartbeat in his eardrums. The sound of his pulsating heart, akin to that of a bass drum, was a sign that he was at death's door, a chilling warning to get help. It seemed that, despite his current relatively healthy physical condition, Stan's body was on high alert, the death's door metaphor brought forth by the horrifying sight of a commercial airline, their final ticket out of South Park, flying above their heads and escaping the infected redneck mountain town. The remaining survivors had snatched that final ticket and were hightailing it to some unknown country as they stood gaping at the sky.

They had missed that flight.

There was a moment of dreadful silence, before the most temperamental of their group of four let out a bellow of utter rage.

"God...fucking...DAMMIT!"

"My God, dude, seriously, shut the fuck up. Do you want to attract another horde of those creatures?"

Eric Cartman threw a scowl at his parka-clad friend, a look that was responded to with a menacing glare. Kenny McCormick, the most mild-mannered of their quartet, was finally nearing the limits of his temper. The other three had never seen their friend lose his cool before, but Stan couldn't help but feel that they were getting pretty damn close to that point.

"We're going to fucking die, Kenny. Don't you get it? The plane's gone. Sure, we might be below eighteen. _Sure_, these things only turn us into them when we're past that age, but we can't possibly sustain full on fights with endless waves of these monsters!"

"That's the attitude that'll kill us, Cartman. Not the zombies."

Kenny struggled to talk in forced whispers in an attempt to get Cartman to lower his voice, an attempt that was completely lost in Cartman's natural desire to overpower and overshadow anybody that he was with.

"What do you expect us to do now, Kenny? Huh? I suppose we could grow wings and fucking _fly_ out of this place, but I need all my spare energy for fighting off the hordes of zombies that come at us every half hour! And would somebody please shut the jew up before I do it myself!"

Stan turned his head in the direction of his super best friend and sighed. The redhead had broken down into tears at the sight of the departing plane and was now cowering at a corner of the roof, hugging his knees for dear life and shaking gently. Kyle Broflovski, usually full of good advice and well-meaning, if somewhat obnoxious leadership, had so far proven to be next to useless in a zombie apocalypse, far too afraid to fire guns and far too emotional to kill the living dead, even after Stan had repeatedly explained to him that the zombies that they were trying to kill them were in fact _not alive_.

"Kyle? Are you alright?"

"Do I f-fucking look alright to y-you?"

Under ordinary circumstances, Stan would have been offended, but Kyle's rude response made him smile despite the shitfest that they seemed to be permanently trapped in. His jarring reply was at least evidence that there was still some fire left in the redhead.

"Give it a moment, man. This must be pretty overwhelming."

"Shit, Stan. I can't handle this."

Kyle's pupils looked unnaturally dilated, and when coupled with his shaking, told Stan that his friend was in the midst of a bad, though strangely mild, panic attack.

"Everything was fine just yesterday, Stan. Then all this shit happened. I can't...I can't deal with this."

"Bad shit happens all the time in this town, Kyle. You just have to-"

"WE'RE FUCKING GOING TO DIE, STAN! I CAN FEEL IT!"

Stan immediately grabbed Kyle's flailing arms and held them down tightly at his sides, clenching his teeth as he exerted sufficient force to ensure that his friend did not do anything stupid before his attack was over. Kyle stared up at his friend with wide, teary eyes, whimpering as his mind, once a jewel of caution, ran wild. The arguing pair standing a short distance away stopped their argument abruptly at the sound of Kyle's shouting, Kenny's face immediately scrunching up in concern and mild panic at the loud sound, and Cartman muttering curses under his breath.

"Stupid fucking ball-less jew…"

The glare that Stan threw him could have melted steel.

"We have one more option."

All eyes turned to Kenny, who had pushed aside his argument with their resident fatass in favor of looking past the array of buildings that were erected in front of their current location. Realising that everyone was hanging intently on his words, Kenny turned back to his friends with a look of determination in his eyes.

"It's a long shot, but it's our only route out of here. We need to make it to Denver via the expressway."

Cartman raised his eyebrows doubtfully.

"That's an awfully long way from this laboratory."

"Well we don't really have much of a choice, do we?"

"Hang on…" Stan looked away from his trembling friend for a second to direct a question to the arguably most composed person in the area. "Can't we just contact someone from outside the town to come in and get us? I mean, we have phones. Wouldn't that be a lot safer than walking out in the open streets like free meat?"

"That would have been a great idea about five minutes ago, Stan." Kenny shook his dirty blond hair out of his eyes as he looked at his friend in morbid amusement. "But if you just look past these few buildings in front of us, you'll see our local telecommunications center ablaze. I'll give you one guess as to what has just conspired there."

Stan felt his blood run colder than before, if that was even possible.

"He's right." Cartman reluctantly muttered out an agreement as he tapped ferociously on his smartphone. "I'm not getting any reception."

"We can either cautiously make our way towards Denver, where this zombie problem is unlikely to have spread to yet, or we could just sit on this rooftop and stew in the mess of zombie bile and guts that we've made and blissfully wait for someone to assume there are survivors left to come looking for us. Your call, Stan."

Stan frowned.

"Alright, alright, I get your point. There's no need to get so passive aggressive on me."

"Sorry." Kenny shrugged apologetically and scratched his head. "Force of habit."

Stan released his grip on Kyle's arms as he felt his jewish friend calming down.

"We need proper weapons if we're going to make such a long trip, though. Actual guns. I mean, I like the crowbars and pistols that we've stolen from the house next to this god forsaken place that we've used thus far as much as the next guy, but if we're going to face hundreds of these monsters we're going to need some real firepower."

Stan tried his best to ignore the twinkle in Cartman's eyes the moment he brought up the topic of firearms.

"Jimbo's guns isn't far from here, and its on the way to Denver anyway. Until then, we could search this place. Mephesto's a psychopath, I won't be surprised if he's kept some guns stashed in here."

"Sounds like a plan. Lets get off this roof."

"Wait!" Kyle got to his feet shakily as the effects of his panic attack started to wear off. "We should search for notes about Mephesto's experiments."

"What the fuck, Jew." Cartman scrunched up his nose in displeasure. "Only you could think about looking for reading material in the midst of a fucking _zombie apocalypse_."

"That's _not_ the reason, fatass." Kyle glared fiercely at his archenemy. "His notes could tell us more about what we're going up against."

"Seriously, jew, what else do we possibly need to know? They're _zombies_, plain and simple."

"Mephesto was psychotic enough to think that giving the dead life was a good idea."

Kyle looked at his three friends with eyes filled with trepidation.

"I won't be surprised if he's tried something much worse with them."

* * *

><p>"For a mild-mannered, albeit insane scientist, Mephesto did have a lot of guns."<p>

The four boys stared in shock and awe at the array of weaponry that was neatly laid out on the shelves in front of them. After searching for half an hour, Kyle had stumbled upon a switch that turned a main wall in the laboratory, exposing a hidden stash of guns, ammunition, and a meth lab.

"Mephesto was into meth, huh?" Cartman chuckled. "Does it make you feel more at home here, Kenny?"

"One more word, asshole, and you'll be eating my fist. Well, you eat everything anyway, you fat tub of lard."

As the boys combed and perused the shelves for weapons of choice, Kyle shuffled through the notes that he had just printed out from the scientist's computer. As he speed-read and tossed aside useless information, he stumbled upon a set of pages that immediately perked his interest. The other three continued to browse the shelves, oblivious to their friend's sudden silence.

"Seriously, dudes. This whackjob actually spent his free time customising weapons. We were living in a town with someone who could have gone on a shooting spree and we had no idea. Holy _fuck_ did he strap a grenade launcher to that rifle?"

Kenny looked away from the handsome array of handguns that he had been admiring and perused the weapon that Cartman was salivating over.

"That's an M203. Single-shot grenade launcher. Looks like this one's strapped onto an ordinary M16. I don't recommend you take that, dude. It's way too slow to reload and fire to be effective, plus you could kill all of us if you miss. _And_ that extra attachment encumbers you, not that any additional weight would make a difference to the overall mass that makes you the massive turd that we know and love."

"_EY!_"

"You're right. I take the 'love' part back."

Under an ordinary situation, Cartman would not have hesitated to tackle Kenny to the ground and attempt to beat him senseless. The sight of the revolver that the economically-challenged teenager was spinning absent-mindedly in his hand, however, held him back. The gun looked so natural in Kenny's hands that he couldn't help but feel a slight twinge of fear.

"Seriously, fatass. If you want an assault rifle, take one of those M16s over there without the grenade launchers on them."

"Eh, rifles are boring." Cartman forced himself to let Kenny's disrespect for his authority slide as he turned back to the shelves. "I want something with a little more power."

"I saw a bunch of shotguns near the back of the room, if you're into those. Just make sure you choose one that doesn't need a pump after each shot."

"What?"

Kenny rolled his eyes.

"Just bring a bunch to me and I'll help you pick one out."

As Cartman scuttled over to the other end of the room like a child in a free-for-all toy store, Stan placed a rifle back onto its shelf before looking at Kenny in mild concern.

"Ken…"

"Yeah, Stan?"

"How do you know so much about guns?"

"Long story, really." Kenny spoke in a casual, unassuming tone. "My beloved parents, as they are, dealt in more than just meth labs and weed. Once in a while my dad would quietly dabble in black market arms dealing, but of course any extra money he got from the transfer and sale of the arms would go towards funding my beloved parents', as they are, drug habits."

Stan nervously bit the skin on the inside of his cheek, unsure of what to say.

"Once in a while he would show me the guns and teach me how use them. As horrifying as it sounds, I actually got quite into the craftsmanship of these things, though before today I've only skeet-shooted a few stolen dinner plates."

As the two friends conversed about Kenny's cringe-worthy home life, the tiniest of the quartet frantically scanned the pages in his hand, his gut sinking lower with each word that he read.

"Holy shit...Stan?"

"Yeah?"

At the very moment, Cartman had gathered as many varieties of shotguns as he could carry. Resting them on both his arms, he turned to walk back to where his friends were waiting, only to be distracted by a guttural growl from behind him.

_What in the..._

"You won't believe this shit, Stan. Mephesto experimented on the zombies that he created. He's made mutants out of the zombies, and from the looks of these notes, they're more dangerous than anything we've seen before.

Stan felt the familiar chill running down his spine.

"What do you mean?"

"Take this mutant, for instance." Kyle frantically shuffled through his pages to find the notes that he had previously browsed. "Special infected species: Hunter. Infinitely agile due to hyper-developed leg muscles, these zombies behave in a similar manner to cats, crouching down before springing forwards to lunge for their prey. They can be distinguished by a unique-"

His monologue was then interrupted by the sound of a blood-chilling shriek that filled their eardrums. Kyle dropped the pages in his hand in shock, while Stan spun instinctively and backed Kyle into a nearby wall to protect him from incoming attacks. Kenny snatched a magnum pistol/revolver hybrid from the shelf in front of him before popping a cartridge of fresh rounds into it without hesitation, the 'click' sound of the cartridge snapping into place echoing loudly throughout the laboratory.

"FUCK!"

The sound of Cartman's yell sent the three friends racing towards the back of the laboratory. Their sprint, however, was cut short by the sight in front of them, one that horrified and baffled them.

"What the...the fuck is that thing?!"

A zombie, blackened by death and its legs bent in a frog-like position, was straddling Cartman, sitting tightly on his torso and restricting his movement, Cartman's selection of shotguns lying strewn harmlessly around him. The zombie stared down mindlessly at the teenager under him, slashing at him with his fingers relentlessly.

"FUCK! HE'S TEARING ME TO PIECES!"

Cartman wail for help snapped the trio out of their bewildered trance. Stan scanned the area for a weapon that he could use against the monster, only to observe Kenny dashing towards their helpless friend in his peripheral vision. Without missing a beat, Kenny raced towards Cartman and, in one swift motion, kicked the zombie in the ribs.

The zombie, stunned, stumbled off a bleeding Cartman.

Rapidly cocking the handgun in his right hand, Kenny raised his weapon before the zombie could spring toward him and fired three successive shots at its blackened figure. The first two shots penetrated its torso, whilst the third burrowed itself into the zombie's skull, the sheer force propelling the bullet driving it straight through the back of its head, its brains splattering messily on the back wall of the laboratory. The zombie's body fell uselessly with a thud onto the ground.

Kenny breathed heavily as adrenaline from the encounter flooded out of his veins. On the floor behind him, Cartman groaned in pain as the thin lines tracing his face and torso started to leak blood.

"A...a little help would be nice..."

* * *

><p>"You know way too much about guns, Kenny."<p>

Kenny ignored Kyle's comment in favor of focusing on the task at hand. After expertly detaching the telescopic scope off the body of one of Mephesto's sniper rifles, he had begun the complex task of fastening the weapon part onto a FN SCAR with a handyman's kit they had found in the corner of the room.

"Why exactly do you have to do that, Kenny?"

"Sniper rifles aren't ideal in this situation." Kenny mumbled to himself as he continued his work. "The SCAR is a great as an assault rifle, but it works even better for long ranges with an adjustable scope."

"...Right. I'll take your word for it."

Kenny looked up from calibrating the sight at his Jewish friend and took in the slightly nauseous expression on his face.

"How's that Desert Eagle treating you?"

Kyle ran his finger across the exterior of the intimidating handgun that Kenny had slipped into his hand and shuddered.

"It's...I don't like it. It feels...unnatural somehow."

"It _is_ unnatural, Kyley-B." Kenny grinned as he poked fun at his friend's Jersey nickname. "The entire concept of firearms is unnatural. This method of instantaneous killing...it really distinguishes us as a species, and I can understand if you're feeling a little tense about having to practice it. But the fact remains that we're in an exceedingly dangerous setting, and there might come a time where one of us is in a life-threatening situation. A situation where we cannot defend ourselves properly. I'm hoping that you'd be able to step up and protect us when the time comes."

Kyle, despite overwhelming doubt that he would be able to pull any sort of trigger, nodded.

Sitting in the corner of the room was a very subdued Cartman, whom even after an impromptu fixing up job, still looked worse for wear despite the fact that his injuries turned out to be minute. His silence, so unnatural to his obnoxious personality, stood out so significantly that everyone else was starting to get worried.

"You okay, Cartman?"

Cartman didn't immediately respond to Kenny's question. For a short moment, it appeared that the earlier attack by the zombie had stunned him into submission, which was strange, but not impossible to deduce. The other three had always known that Cartman was timid in dangerous situations despite his bullish and arrogant exterior. However, before any of them could say anything else, Cartman stood from where he had been sitting abruptly before picking up one of his new shotguns and throwing Kenny a strange look, one that Kenny couldn't quite decipher. He appeared grateful, apprehensive and yet determined at the same time.

"Thanks for the help, Kenny. We should get moving if we want to get to the bridge."

Kenny appeared to consider saying something, but merely shook his head before snapping the final parts to his improvised assault rifle into place and slinging it onto his back, thinking a moment before snatching up a Desert Eagle similar to the one Kyle was still trying to get used to.

"You're right. We should at least get to another safe spot before the sun goes down. Let's go."

It was a very strange thing, being in the middle of a zombie apocalypse. There was just something about the danger and the hypnagogic nature of their settings that brought about a heightened sense of solidarity that the four, despite being friends, wouldn't have been able to feel on an ordinary day. They knew it was a long way to the bridge, and they knew there was a huge chance that something terrible might happen along the way. But none of them could help feeling that if shit did decide to go down, there'd be three other people capable and willing to help in any way they could. Anything seemed possible when the four troublemakers, South Park's infamous team of perpetually scheming adolescents, worked together. In the end, Kenny might have been right. It was the attitude of impending doom that would kill them, not the zombies.

As the four snatched up whatever provisions and weapons they could carry without becoming severely encumbered by their load, they reached for the door to the demented scientist's laboratory.

It was time for the Hunger Games to start. Only this time, there was actual hunger in play.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note<strong> - I'm going to throw this out here first now that I've actually decided (after much consideration...one year into publishing the preview! Good grief) to start the story. The concept of a zombie apocalypse is an overly done fictional idea, attempted by so many writers and film producers that it's sometimes honestly a drag for me to think about it. While it might seem contradictory for me to write this note at the end of the first paragraph of a zombie fic, let me just say that I'm mainly doing this fic as a way for me to subvent my need (and weakness) of writing action scenes. A zombie apocalypse would be rife with action, after all, and what better way to overcome my weakness by occasionally practicing and getting reviews?

I'll try my very best to make my writing palatable for you all, and I apologise in advance if updating for this fic becomes somewhat sporadic. I have a tendency to do that with my writing, and it seems that this might become an even greater problem with this story, since it really is tough for me to put action scenes in my head down into words.

Reviews greatly appreciated (especially so in the fic, cause I actively want to improve), and for the handful of you who have given your blessing to the continuation of the story, I thank you all. This chapter is dedicated to you guys.

~SUITELIFEFAN


	3. Chapter 2

**They Left Four Dying - Chapter 2**

The quartet of makeshift zombie killers slowly but steadily made their way across the town, making as little noise as possible so as not to alert the undead to their location. Once in a while, a lone zombie would stand in their way, disorientated and not yet aware of their presence. Said zombie would be quickly dispatched with a single shot to the head, usually courtesy of Kenny's handgun. Cartman had insisted on some close range target practice (a notion that Stan shuddered at as he pictured a bloodthirsty fatass mowing down hordes of zombies and thoroughly enjoying himself), but Kenny had thankfully dismissed his inner demon by stating very logically that a handgun would be much more quiet than a shotgun, and it would be in the best of their interests to not attract the deceased to themselves.

As they walked through the town, Kenny would occasionally offer to allow Kyle to practice with his own pistol (Cartman protested very vehemently and called Kenny names for allowing the Jew to have fun while shutting his desires away), but Kyle would always merely shudder before turning away quietly whenever Kenny urged him to take a shot. After a few painfully awkward attempts on Kenny's part to get their resident redhead to release the safety on his Desert Eagle, Stan decided to step in.

"That's enough, Kenny. Don't make him do something he doesn't want to do."

There was zero snideness in Stan's tone and speech, but Kyle visibly cringed at the underlying meaning of his best friend's words. Beneath the desire to protect him, there lay obvious doubt in Kyle's abilities as a killer. As much as the group wanted to trust each other, it was clear that all of them, Stan included, treated him as the weakest link. It appeared that his earlier panic attack had the others dismissing his ability to be useful in their current situation. Kenny didn't sense anything in Stan's words, or he simply didn't care, when he turned to him and frowned.

"He'll have to do it at some point, Stan. Might as well let him get used to it."

"You're making him and everyone else uncomfortable."

"I'm just trying to think about what needs to be done in the future. If something attacks him, I don't want him to freeze up and not be able to protect himself-"

"You don't need to worry about me."

All eyes turned to Kyle, including Cartman, though he tried hard to appear not to care about Stan and Kenny's little argument.

"You don't need to worry about me, and you don't need to worry about yourselves, either. I'll step up and protect you guys too, if need be. You guys might doubt me now, and I might even doubt myself a little, but as gay as this sounds, I really do love you guys. If something happens and we're in danger, I'll do everything in my power to make sure all of us make it out alive. I might not be that comfortable with a gun in my hand, but I'll fire at anything that tries to touch you all."

Kenny looked quietly back at Kyle, waiting for him to continue.

"I don't like killing things even if they're already dead, Kenny. I know it might sound ridiculous to you, but that's how I am. I see these things walking around, and I can't help but think...these were people we used to pass by on the streets when we were playing, people we used to greet and talk to. And now, because of some wacko scientist's craziness, so many of the people we used to know are dead but walking. It's sick, Ken. I really hate it, but I can't do anything about it. The least I can do for them is to walk past them and not hurt them if they don't hurt us. You might think differently, but that's how I see it."

Kyle then gritted his teeth resolutely, his grip on his weapon tightening.

"I need you to trust me, Kenny. We won't be able to work together properly if you don't believe that I'm capable."

Kenny appeared to stand stock still for a moment as he pondered Kyle's words, Stan looking between him and Kyle, appearing considerably happier at hearing Kyle's little speech than he had been before. Before Cartman could interject with one of his snide remarks, he slapped a hand on his mouth and ignored his indignant grunt of protest. Kenny continued staring at Kyle, the two not breaking eye contact for a second. Finally, a small smile appeared on Kenny's face before he firmly patted Kyle on his shoulder.

"You're right about me thinking differently, but still...I trust you, Kyle."

* * *

><p>It was about an hour before they reached the Blacks' household. The sun set early on South Park even in the midst of a zombie apocalypse, and the home of their childhood friend Token Black had been the first planned stop in their journey towards Denver. Cartman had been the one who had voiced his opinion that Token, with his affluence, would undoubtedly leave behind the best place for them to rest in for the night and refuel before they continued walking the streets. The other three had found little to contradict in his words, and though they knew that Cartman merely wanted to sleep amidst luxury in Token's huge house, there was a small part of them all that wanted to enjoy the exact same thing.<p>

The first sign that there might be some trouble brewing ahead within the guarded compounds of the Blacks' household was the fact that the gate, which was usually locked to protect against intruders, was left completely astrewn and ajar, as though waiting for their arrival. Stan pointed out that the Blacks might have left the gate open when they were hastening to flee the city, but the bloodstains on the iron bars put a massive damper in his optimism. The compound surrounding Token's home was surprisingly deserted, void of both the dead and the undead. As they approached the house, Kenny cocked his improvised rifle, raising the tension in the air significantly. He led the way to the house and quietly spoke to the three standing behind him.

"Stan, take the left. Kyle, the right. Cartman, look after the back and make sure we don't get sneaked up on."

"You're acting all military-ish, Ken."

"It's a little ridiculous, but if it saves our lives, I don't give a crap about that."

"True."

Placing a slightly shaking hand on the doorknob, Kenny applied pressure, and was surprised when he actually managed to get the door open. It appeared that Stan might have been right about the Blacks fleeing their home in a hurry. The door creaked a little as Kenny slowly pushed it open, causing the three behind him to cringe. The sound wasn't even loud enough to wake a sleeping person, but in their anxiety, all sounds appeared to be multiplied tenfold.

"You'd think Token's family would be rich enough to get someone to oil their hinges."

"Shh."

As they made their way across the living room, they took in the scene in front of them. All four boys remembered the gorgeous house that their black minority friend lived in, and though the house was still standing and the furniture still mostly intact, the place was in utter disarray. Papers and glass were scattered all over the floor, and though Kyle tried his best to ignore it, he couldn't help but be a little disgusted by the faint smell of old blood that appeared to permeate throughout the large home. It was a terribly unsettling thing, to see their old friend's home thrown into such a horrible state, and it made them a little worried about what they might find on the second floor.

The feeling of trepidation that the quartet felt at that point of time was nearly indescribable. They had admittedly lost the friendly closeness that they had with Token and some of their other friends by the time elementary school had ended, and though they were now once again in their old friend's home, they were here for the express purpose for survival, not for junk food and video games. It was a horrible thing, to be thrown into such a morbid and treacherous situation in the midst of something so familiar, and though they knew they had to do whatever they could to survive, there was something about being in Token Black's home uninvited that made their entire venture feel more wrong than it felt before.

"I guess...this isn't such a nice place to spend the night in after all, huh?"

It took about fifty seconds for the little group to make their way to the stairs, and five more for Cartman to step heavily onto a creaky floorboard and cause the other three to jump out of their skins before glaring angrily at him, Kyle cuffing the fatass on his head for good measure. Stan broke up the fight before it could even get started, and they steadily progressed past the shattered chandelier on the floor and the broken potted plants that littered the ground with soil. As they reached the first door, which they recalled belonged to Token's bedroom, Kenny once again placed his hand on the doorknob. Just as he was about to turn it, he hesitated, a blank expression on his face. Stan placed a concerned hand on his friend's shoulder.

"Kenny?"

Kenny shook his head before turning to his friends with worried eyes.

"I know you guys know what we signed up for, and we're all alive and we really need to clear this place out of everything dangerous before we can start preparing to rest in it, but..."

He appeared to lose track of his words, but Kyle finished his sentence, knowing exactly what he wanted to say.

"But we might encounter some of our old friends, and they might have died...or turned."

Cartman and Stan both shared a look of disgust and horror as Kenny nodded to Kyle. Before anyone could protest, he spoke up again, effectively silencing all discussion.

"We don't know if what we found out was true. Mephesto somehow designed the disease to only affect those below the age of eighteen, but we don't know if what he really did was accurate enough. We're all lucky to be just below eighteen, but I can't remember when everyone's birthdays are, and its very possible that if they were already eighteen they might be amongst the zombies. If we open this door right now, and somebody we know really is inside, we'll have to do it. It's the only logical thing for us to do. Whoever's inside would be dead, and will immediately try to kill us once they notice us. We just have to remember that they're already _dead_, and we'd actually be doing them a favor by killing them again to make sure that their corpse doesn't continue to roam South Park lifelessly looking for fresh meat. We have to keep that in mind."

No one appeared to want to comment on Kenny addressing who was obviously Token in the third-person, and instead settled with nodding and readying their weapons. Even Kyle, with his unpracticed hand in firearms, looked determined.

"Let's go."

Taking in a deep breath to steel himself, Kenny turned the doorknob and, applying pressure onto the wooden door with his body weight, pushed his way into Token's room. There was a sudden collective intake of breath from all four boys as the tension in the air grew thick enough to almost see, and when their eyes settled on the messy but otherwise unoccupied room, it felt as though the sky had opened up and whatever ethereal being up there had decided to release oxygen back onto the earth again.

"Thank fucking God."

They continued their systematic check of the rooms on the upper floor. It seemed wrong, Stan couldn't help thinking, using the word "systematic" to describe their task at hand. It almost made the job seem clinical, mindless. The thought of them getting rid of the undead emotionlessly somehow brought a queasy feeling to Stan's stomach. It was true that he had played his part in eliminating a significant number of zombies already, but he realised to his abject horror that he had felt nearly nothing as he pulled triggers and blew out brains. In some sense, Kyle was right. Those...things used to be living people. The last thing Stan wanted was to lose even _himself_ in the midst of the death that had covered South Park like a massive coroner's sheet.

Little did he know that that very notion, that small moment where Stan was caught off-guard by his own thoughts, would be the first metaphorical blade between the group's shoulderblades.

Stan pushed open the door to the upstairs bathroom carelessly, completely forgetting what Kenny had said about being discreet and noticing too late when a loud screech coming from the friction between the door and its badly maintained hinge shook him from his stupor. Darting his eyes into the tiny bathroom, Stan felt his mind immediately freeze up at the sight of a single female zombie standing within it. It didn't occur to him that this particular zombie was different from the rest, or that she appeared to wear an aura of impending doom, or that her hands were somehow mutated into massive, finger-length claws, mere vestiges of what they once were. It didn't occur to him that she was staring right at him with deadly, red eyes and shaking violently like a mad woman, or that Kyle was tugging at his arm in absolute terror and urgently whispering something into his ear, or that Cartman and Kenny's guns were already erect and ready to fire.

The thing that woke Stan up from his trance was the scream.

It was a scream that the four had never imagined to possibly come out of something that looked that human, or possibly coming out of any other living being present on earth. If demons from hell screamed, it wouldn't have been ridiculous to compare what they possibly could sound like with the ghastly, blood curdling, hair-raising shriek that was emitted from within the female zombie's throat. Stan felt his throat seize up with a feeling of fear that he had never felt before in his life, and before Kyle could stop him in time, he had already raised his AK-47 and instinctively fired a few rounds right into the zombie's chest.

The zombie stumbled back, and Stan thought for a miraculous moment that he had finished the job. Then, the zombie looked up into his eyes yet again with her own blood red orbs of living death, and Stan almost literally felt his soul tearing from his body in an attempt to escape from her gaze.

"Shit, shit shit shit shit..."

The first crack the quartet heard as the witch flung her claws outwards with superhuman strength and ripped the sink off the wall was another indication that what they were dealing which was something not just undead, but downright demonic.

"Run...RUN!"

The other three didn't even need Kenny's warning to know what they had to do. All four took flight, running in whatever direction their internal compasses saw fit, all the while looking back and praying that the she-demon was not chasing them. That was the second mistake that the group made. In the midst of any dangerous situation, splitting up was a bad, a _very_ bad idea. However, their internal flight signals were shutting off their mental faculties, the only sole instruction in all their brains being the immediate need to flee and save their own hides.

On a biological standpoint, it made good sense. On a group survival standpoint, not so much.

It took ten seconds for Kenny to realise that he was in relative safety. It took another ten for him to catch his breath. By the time twenty crucial seconds had past, Kenny finally realised that he had foolishly separated himself from the group in the middle of the largest house in the entirety of South Park.

_Fuck...this isn't good..._

* * *

><p>Perhaps it was because he had been the one to startle her in the first place, or maybe it was because he was the one who had fired at her, but all reasons were lost on Stan as he ran as quickly as his legs could carry him through what felt like the longest corridor he had ever set foot in in his life. A quick glance backwards indicated that the witch was right on his tail, frighteningly fast, and looking like she wanted to eat him alive, and when Stan realised that his friends were nowhere in sight and that he had been left to face the witch alone, there was no time left to curse them for ditching him or curse himself for splitting up with them in the first place.<p>

The first blow that struck Stan hit him with the force of a bulldozer straight in his back, and the athletic but inadequately built young man found himself flying, striking a nearby wall with incredible force before falling down onto the ground. The hot, searing pain hit him a second later, and as his hand ran over the point where the witch had hit him, he felt warm, runny liquid and cringed whilst trying to raise himself back onto his feet. The witch didn't leave even a small opening for mercy as she lashed out yet again, slamming Stan back into the wall with inhuman force, his head striking the wall first, causing blood to gush downwards from a freshly opened wound before blurring his vision.

The witch screamed again.

* * *

><p>The first instinct that Cartman had when fleeing from the witch had been to immediately high-tail it downstairs, in the faint hope that if she was chasing him, she would stumble on the stairs and leave Cartman with a valid opening to finish her off. It was an admirably clear-minded thought whilst Cartman's brain was simultaneously experiencing wild panic, and when Cartman finally reached the bottom of the stairs and looked up, there was no sight of the screaming bitch that had started chasing them. Mild relief was quickly overcome by the feeling of fear at the thought of being isolated from everyone else, and Cartman decided to make his way back upstairs to find the rest of his group.<p>

A blubbering sound from behind him made him instinctively turn around and fire a single burst from his shotgun. Cartman's vision barely even caught a sight of the massive, obese zombie standing right behind him before his shotgun pellets tore it apart, but not before showering its immediate vicinity, Cartman included, with a foul smelling, viscous yellow liquid that smelt like it could wake the dead alone. Cartman yelled as his eyes were covered with the yellow gunk, blinding him momentarily. He cursed inwardly as he attempted to rub the smelly liquid off himself, thanking the heavens that it didn't feel corrosive, at the very least.

Then he heard the sound of windows breaking and what sounded like a hundred feet on carpeted floors, and he knew that he was screwed.

* * *

><p>Kyle had never been a particularly lucky person, but he certainly felt like one when he darted into a random room on the second floor and shut the door tightly behind him, breathing heavily and trying to listen out for the sound of clawing and footsteps. Not hearing either, he allowed himself a short reprieve as he shut his eyes and relaxed himself against the wooden door, trying to erase the sight and sound of the witch screaming from his head.<p>

Kyle hardly had time to react to the sudden guttural growl that he heard from within the room. His eyelids flying open, Kyle barely leapt out of the way in time as another hunter, looking remarkably similar to the one that had attacked Cartman back at Mephesto's laboratory, sprung at him from behind a table and smashed onto the wooden door. Kyle immediately raised his Desert Eagle in the direction of the zombie, but before he could fire, his eyes fell upon the shirt that the zombie was wearing; a light purple, somewhat torn up Armani Exchange shirt with a large letter "T" spelled out on the front in light orange. Kyle had never felt worse as he stared gapingly back at the zombie, who was already crouching and preparing for a second pounce, its eyes dead to the world.

"...T-Token?"

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note<strong> - This is probably the most intense cliffhanger that I've written, and I've written a lot of stuff. I present to you all...the four-way cliffhanger. I would take a bow, but I'd look absolutely ridiculous to everyone sitting around me right now.

I hope you all enjoyed the chapter. Of course, you'd understand what was happening better if you've played L4D2 before, but I tried to make the descriptions of the zombies quite vivid for the sake of those of you who don't.

Reviews Appreciated.

~SUITELIFEFAN


	4. Chapter 3

**They Left Four Dying - Chapter 3**

It was one thing for a pacifist like Kyle to fire a weapon at something he believed contained life. It was another thing for a pacifist like Kyle to fire a weapon at somebody he actually _knew_, _hung out with before_, and _respected_. It would have taken all the irony in the world, combined into a ball of morbid humour and thrown at the Blacks' mansion by the hand of God himself for the latter situation to actually happen, but as it turned out, South Park just had something that made for fantastic ironic comedy.

Kyle's mind, on the other hand, was as far away from jokes as humanly possible as he stared into the dead eyes of Token Black, the grip on his pistol quivering and his lower lip trembling as he fought the urge to cry. Kyle had always been the most emotional of their group of four, though his excess emotional energy was usually spent spitting out verbal counter-missiles to Cartman's volley of anti-semitic jibes, making him come off to everyone as more of a fiery redhead than a prissy, crybaby one. Kyle hardly cried, even when he was by himself, after all. It seemed like such a ridiculous thing to do when he was living in a town where he consistently had to deal with things that were out of the ordinary. The only appropriate reaction to the town's insanity was to either be angry about it, or to laugh it off. Kyle was, most decidedly, not the giggly type.

Kyle was still, however, an emotional kid. And in the face of this situation, where his old childhood friend was staring at him with hungry eyes, like he wanted to eat him alive, there was very little room for either rage or comedy. Still in partial denial at the utter crappiness of the hell that had descended upon his town, Kyle squeaked out two syllables, his gun still clutched firmly, albeit shakily, in his hands.

"Token?"

The hunter's reaction startled him. Upon hearing him speak, the zombie growled and refocused its attention on its small, but still meaty prey before pouncing yet again, more ferociously than before, its legs springing it outwards with inhuman force. Kyle hastened to feint to the side as he had done successfully before, but wasn't as lucky or fortunate this time round as he felt the hunter's firm grip upon his leg before it pulled him to the ground, Kyle yelping in pain as he landed painfully on his side. Gasping a little in his shock and fear, Kyle felt rough fabric rubbing against his skin, and realised to his horror that the zombie was actually _reeling_ him in against the carpet on the floor, his eyes looking menacingly hungry as he opened his gaping jaw.

Kyle knew that he was exaggerating to himself a little, but this was become too much of a convertor-belt-ish situation for him to be comfortable, and dead-Token or not, Kyle was _not_ going to be eaten like a slab of steak. With more strength than he thought possible of himself, Kyle lashed out with his right foot, feeling the zombie's jaw crack as he contacted the beast's chin, causing the hunter to stumble backwards and lose its grip on Kyle's foot. Kyle shakily unclicked the safety on his pistol, but before he could even raise his weapon and steady it, the hunter was on him again, this time gripping on his torso and pushing him against the floor, its jaw practically clicking with anticipation of meat and the new injury that it couldn't feel.

Kyle had never felt more terrified in his life. In the midst of the fear that he might die at the hands of one of his old friends, he heard the sound of a shout that sounded like it came from downstairs, and his entire body seized up. It was as though a spark had spontaneously ignited in his head, and although he was afraid, he had promised Kenny something just before they had entered this God forsaken hellhole of a house. He had promised that he would be able to not only look after himself, but protect them with every breath that he could muster from his body.

With that in mind, rage finally began to trickle into Kyle consciousness. The zombie that was straddling him was _not_ Token Black. He was _not_ their resident friendly rich kid. That kid was dead, and Kyle was somehow sure that if he was still alive, he _wouldn't_ want to be in a situation where he was pinning his Jewish friend to the wall in a painfully compromising situation and wanting to eat his brains out.

He had to do Token a favor.

Screaming bloody murder, Kyle let loose the last figment of self-control that he had before raising his hand, grabbing the zombie's head and smashing it as hard as he possibly could into the adjacent wall, watching as it fell to the ground in a messy heap. When the hunter twitched beneath his feet and turned its head to face him, its jaw still clicking with anticipation, Kyle slammed his eyes shut and gritted his teeth before firing round after round into the zombie's figure, not letting up until the click of a hollow chamber woke him from his blind trigger-happiness.

Turning violently away from the dead zombie, Kyle stumbled a little before finding his feet again, wiping the hot tears that had leaked unconsciously from his eyes away. Spotting a bottle of alcohol and somehow instinctively knowing that he was going to need it, Kyle snatched it up and threw the door open.

There was time to cry later.

* * *

><p>His rifle lay by his side, forgotten in the midst of blood and terror. Stan couldn't feel anything, and couldn't even move a muscle to defend himself. He couldn't feel the cold sweat running down his back, or the blood that was streaming down open wounds that were mercilessly torn open by the witch, who was attacking in the way that suggested that she was running on nothing but blank rage. It was antithetical to think that the dead could process emotions, but the redness in the witch's eyes and the rawness of her attacks suggested that she was not only alive, but was desperate to swap Stan's life for her own. The one thing Stan could feel was the life rapidly draining away with the blood pouring from his body.<p>

Another slash, and Stan winced as the witch's blow struck his face, leaving behind a sharp gash on his cheek. Another slash, and Stan screamed in agony. He had definitely felt that one. Another slash, and Stan felt pained tears streaming down his cheeks as he bit down on his lips hard enough to draw blood, in a futile attempt to distract himself from the pain that was radiating from his body.

Then there was another scream that sounded nothing like his or the witch's. Stan turned his head weakly in the direction of the sound, only to see a pint-sized blond boy dressed in a dirty orange parka dashing with all his might towards him, his rifle raised magnificently above his head like a tribal spear.

With a growl that sounded almost feral, Kenny, short and unassuming as he was, drove the butt of his rifle into the witch's unsuspecting chin with as much force as his small stature could muster, watching in cruel satisfaction as the witch's neck snapped backwards before she stumbled, crashing into the wall directly behind her. Realising that he had forgotten to load his rifle, but not wanting to give her any time to recover, Kenny unsheathed his loaded Desert Eagle from its holster, unclicked the safety, and emptied his entire magazine into the demon, yelling as loudly as he could in his rage, his earlier warnings to his friends about being stealthy forgotten in his need to avenge Stan for the blood he had spilled.

It wasn't until he heard an anguished moan from behind him did Kenny's entire posture slump, all the adrenaline fading from his veins as he re-evaluated his priorities. Turning around, Kenny sheathed his pistol before kneeling down, taking in the sorry sight on the ground before placing his palms on a particularly nasty wound on Stan's stomach and applying pressure, a worried expression etched on his face.

"I seriously...owe you one, dude."

"Don't thank me yet, Stan. We need to find the other two and regroup before leaving this place. Thank me once we're safe."

"Her claws hurt like hell, but I don't think I'm seriousl-LOOK OUT!"

Startled by Stan's sudden outburst, Kenny spun back around, only to see five sharp miniature appendages flying towards him. Realising that it would take far too long to pick up his weapon to defend himself, Kenny raised his arm to protect his face, yelling out in agony as the witch left five deep cuts on the skin of his forearm. Kenny reached to his side in an attempt to snatch up his rifle, only to be beaten to the punch by a shower of 5.56mm rounds tearing their way into rock hard but weakened flesh. It appeared that that final attack finally did it, the witch falling to the ground almost in slow motion, like at the end of a hard boss battle of some video game. Kenny turned his head and saw Stan standing up, his AK-47 still smoking from the sheer velocity of its semi-automatic firing.

Stan wobbled a little before the weight of all his injuries fell upon him in a single swoop. He crashed to the ground, his rifle falling with a loud clatter next to him.

"Shit...that really took it out of me..."

Kenny was on him in an instant, angry tears in his eyes.

"Stan, you idiot! Why did you do that when you're bleeding out! I could have looked after myself!"

Stan merely grinned weakly at his friend.

"I don't know...my body just moved..."

* * *

><p>Eric Cartman was not a pushover. Sure, he was an anti-semitic who also consistently ripped on black people. Sure, he was an arrogant bastard who believes that the rest of the universe orbits around his massive gravitational pull. Sure, he was in constant denial that he was fat. Eric Cartman was all of those things, but he was <em>not, <em>in any circumstance ever, a pushover. As far he was concerned, Cartman was damn strong, God fucking dammit.

But as wave after wave after wave of zombies poured through the broken glass windows on the first floor of Token's home towards him, Cartman felt his strength rapidly running out. There was just something about the fear of being eaten, the sound of dozens of feet on parquet floors, the disorientation brought about by gooey crap in his eyes, and the lack of knowledge regarding exactly _when_ the horde of zombies would deplete itself that made for a remarkably potent combination that could bring even the strongest person down to their knees. Cartman was still holding his own relatively well, having navigated via instinct and found a nice corner to funnel the zombies into and blast their faces in with his shotgun, but his patience and willpower were gradually wearing thin.

As the shotgun gave a hollow "click", Cartman swore before reaching fat fingers into the ammunition pouch on his side before popping shells back into the gun one by one. Shotguns had a ton of power, but had an astonishingly cumbersome reloading mechanism that made Cartman swear under his breath with every single cartridge he handled, the zombie horde getting disturbingly closer and closer to him with every reloaded shell.

"Fuck...fuck...fuck..."

One of the zombies succeeded in touching his foot, and Cartman, not expecting the sudden contact, yelped before kicking it back into its group of similarly undead friends. Another zombie succeeded in grabbing his arm, and Cartman screamed before shoving it off himself. His shotgun was barely loaded, and Cartman estimated that he would be finished with his weapon ammunition in about two more minutes of fighting. As what felt like swarms of zombies surrounded him, Cartman closed his already blinded eyes in abject terror just before he heard a familiar voice that he somehow couldn't recognise amidst the pounding of his heart in his ears, shouting at him from a short distance away.

"CARTMAN! STAND THE FUCK UP!"

There was the sound of gunshots, and the few zombies that had succeeded in getting close to Cartman fell off him like dying flies. Cartman barely had time to get to his feet before what felt like a dishcloth was flung into his face. Before he could express his indignation at the rude treatment, his saviour shouted at him yet again, anger flooding his voice.

"Clean your face, fatass! I can't hold them off forever!"

A few cursory wipes cleared Cartman's vision, and Cartman's jaw nearly dropped at the sight in front of him. Kyle Broflovski, duel-wielding two Desert Eagles, curly hair sticking to his face from sweat and a ferocious snarl on his face, looking far more badass than he had ever imagined a short Jewish boy could look.

Shaking himself from his stunned stupor (Kyle's menacing glare whilst dispatching undead after undead helping tremendously with that), Cartman snatched up his shotgun and continued the process of filing its chamber up with as many rounds as he could.

"Is your shotgun full?!"

"Yes!"

"Good! Fire at a constant rhythm, buy me some time!"

A cursory glimpse to his right revealed a bottle of vodka that Kyle had somehow procured from wherever he had been before, tucked firmly in his pocket. Cartman wanted to ask questions, but decided against it at the last moment and settled for pounding zombie flesh to bits with his gun, yelling unrestrainedly through his adrenaline rush now that making loud sounds wouldn't exactly hurt their situation. Kyle popped the bottle open with some difficulty before pouring about a quarter of the vodka onto the floor, making Cartman grunt resentfully. Ignoring Cartman's indignation at wasting good liquor, Kyle snatched up the bile-stained cloth that Cartman had discarded on the floor before stuffing it as tightly as he could into the neck of the bottle, turning the entire thing over a few times. Extracting a box of matches from his other pocket, Kyle struck one alight. Cartman's eyes widened as he realised what Kyle was trying to do.

"Jew..."

Kyle caught his eye.

"You understand what I'm going to do, right Cartman? Once I toss it, run for the steps, and don't look back."

Kyle didn't wait for Cartman's response before he held the match to the dirtied cloth. As the cloth started to burn, Kyle extinguished the match under his foot before grabbing the impromptu Molotov cocktail by its neck. Taking a deep breath, he flung the deadly homemade fire bomb towards the broken windows, where zombies were still relentlessly pouring into the house from. There was a crunching sound as the bottle shattered against the wooden floors, and moments later, the small fire made contact with the massive puddle of alcohol that was soaking the floors.

Inferno.

It became clear to both the boys that they had not expected the sheer magnitude of the fire that would spring from such a deceptively small bottle of liquor, both boys yelling in shock as the heat and blinding light from the fire hit them. The zombies appeared to be stunned by the sudden appearance of the fire, which effectively halted the flow of zombies into the house and started eating at those that were too close to the epicentre of the rapid oxidation. The zombies no longer had functioning pain receptors, merely making annoyed noises as they continued to try and move forwards towards their prey, before falling apart as the flames disintegrated their already decomposing bodies.

The Nazi and the Jew, the most unlikely team ever, raced as quickly as they could up the stairs. Cartman was pulling forward ahead from Kyle, who tripped on one of the steps that led to the second floor in his haste, but before he even found the time to fall to the ground, a large hand was already pulling him back up onto his feet and urging him on with a desperate shove on his back.

"Be careful, you stupid Jew!"

Kyle hid his surprise at Cartman's comment well. He silently added it onto the list of things that he had time to do later.

As the pair ran as quickly as their legs could carry them through the corridor of the second floor, trying their best to ignore the fact that the fire and the few remaining surviving zombies appeared to be gaining on them, they skidded to a halt at the sight of a familiar boy in an orange parka, who appeared to be shaking a little as he knelt down next to another boy in a brown jacket and a red poof ball hat. Kyle felt his heart plummet when he saw the pool of blood spilt haphazardly on the floor around the boy, the torn up remnants of his precious jacket, and the corpse of the she-demon that had gone apeshit on them just minutes ago, a twisted growl still on her face and her dagger-like fingers coated with what looked like his super best friend's blood.

Kyle had planned to cry by himself when they had escaped from the Blacks' festering hellhole of a house, but he couldn't resist a desperate sob as he saw Stan groaning on the floor, blood still leaking from countless wounds on his body. Kenny finally appeared to notice the reappearance of his two other friends, and when he turned his head to face them, his look of determination and momentary relief juxtaposed horribly with the tear streaks across his cheeks.

"Thank fucking God you guys are alive."

Cartman finally finished off the last remaining zombies that were chasing them with a few pops of his shotgun before turning back to Kenny, his jaw clenched at the sight of Stan bleeding on the floor.

"We've got to get out of here, Kenny. We got ambushed by a horde; Kyle had to set the lower floor alight to hold them off. We need to take a window."

"Can you walk, Stan?"

Another pained groan from the boy on the ground told them all they needed to know, and Kyle resisted the urge to let out another sob. Without a moment of hesitation, Cartman knelt down on his knees before scooping Stan up in his arms in a bridal style and rising to his feet, the strength that he had lost in the earlier fight against the infected downstairs seemingly back in his arms without explanation. As Kenny used his rifle to smash a nearby window that led to a climbable tree, Cartman turned to a distraught, trembling Kyle and spoke softly but sternly.

"Stan's not going to die, Jew. You hear me? We need to get him out of here. Pull all that badass that I saw just now out of your ass and wait till we're finished with this and safe before you cry. I promise I won't laugh at you later, Kyle."

Maybe it was Cartman's assurance of Stan's survival that ignited a spark in him, or perhaps it was the fact that Cartman had inexplicably addressed him by his actual name, but Kyle appeared to snap out of his funk instantly before nodding at Cartman, drawing his two pistols and covering their backs as Cartman carried Stan as carefully as he could out the window, the sound of Stan's small winces and grimaces as he was shaken back and forth acting as fuel to his burning fire.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note<strong> - Alright, I'll admit it...this was fun to write. Not that I like seeing Stan bleed or anything, but I like writing about a badass Kyle. I know people portray him differently in FanFiction, and I know Kyle is nowhere near a pushover on the original show, but I needed one character to be a little timid at the start of the story and grow as the story progressed, and it sure as hell wasn't going to be Kenny, I'll tell you that. I hope my action scenes weren't distracting, and that you guys could picture what I had written down properly. Those who play L4D2 will know that Molotov cocktails _do _exist in the game, and this therefore justifies my decision to include one in this chapter to carry the plot forward. Whether I will decide to use them again is another thing altogether.

The next chapter will be a little quieter (and perhaps shorter too), giving the characters some time for some well overdue introspection. I know I wrote this story as a primarily action fic for practice, but that doesn't mean that I can't package and craft it into something that is both fun and thoughtful.

Reviews Appreciated.

~SUITELIFEFAN


	5. Chapter 4

**They Left Four Dying - Chapter 4**

"Fucking stupid of me, I swear to God. Fucking. Stupid. God. Fucking. Dammit..."

"Kenny, you're bringing everybody down, brah."

Kenny stopped his hammering to glare at Cartman, the larger boy flinching a little at the fierce look in his eyes and the hammer clutched tightly in his right hand.

"Sorry, dude...just a joke."

Kenny scoffed before turning back to the doors of Jimbo's Guns, which he and Cartman were in the middle of barricading with a few planks of wood and nails that they had found. It was a minor miracle that the gun store had been located so close to the Blacks' residence, and that they had encountered close to no interference when walking the few hundred metres from the burning house, the only look that they spared their childhood friend's home being a quick backwards glance as the largest and grandest house in all of South Park's second floor collapsed onto its first with a thunderous sound.

There was just something about the destruction of the Blacks' residence and the sight of a badly hurt Stan Marsh that served as a terrible omen of what was about to come.

"If that was a joke, Cartman, it wasn't funny. We fucked up so bad that I can't even begin to describe it. _I_ fucked up so bad that I can't even..."

Cartman continued hammering as quietly as he could as he allowed Kenny's words to trail off into incoherent mumbling. Based on what he knew of the orange-parka-clad boy, he wasn't surprised that he would be the most self-deprecating of them all. After since middle school, Kenny had tried his best to stand out more in their group of four after maintaining a background role back when they were in fourth grade, and he had accomplished that by being fiercely protective of all of them, even him, who constantly taunted him about his family's poverty.

"I'm going to take a break."

"Whatever, fatass."

Deciding to let the jibe slide, Cartman stood from where he had been squatting and hammering and wiped his brow. Standing back to admire the makeshift but effective job that he and Kenny had done on barricading the door, he walked towards the back room. Kyle and Stan were already in there, Stan still lying comatose from the wounds that he had suffered thanks to the witch, but thankfully still very much alive. The expression on Kyle's face was blank even as he bandaged his friend up, but Cartman, who was skilled in sensing the temperament of the Jew after years of blatant antagonism and mind games, could tell that his mind was in a state of mild disarray judging by the slight shaking of his hands as he handled the first aid kit.

"How's he doing?"

Cartman's sudden words surprised Kyle, who flinched and instinctively reached for the pistol resting next to him before allowing his panic to deflate a little when he saw Cartman looking at him from the entrance to the room. It appeared that their less-than-ideal experience in the two story mansion had traumatised the sensitive Jew somewhat, as Cartman could tell from his reaction and the slight fear in his eyes even as the possibility of being attacked faded away. Apparently, there was nothing like a good zombie apocalypse to fuck up innocence.

"He's fine...he sustained loads of cuts, but none of them are too deep. I just had to disinfect and plaster up most of them, and I stitched up the bigger ones myself."

"...I'm surprised he didn't scream."

"He was too far out of it to realise that I was piercing his skin with a needle."

Cartman nodded solemnly at Kyle's words and settled with sitting down next to them, staring quietly as Kyle finished off the first aid job almost professionally, something that indicated to Cartman that the Jew had actually bothered to pay attention during Health Class back in school. He wanted to say something to Kyle, but couldn't find the words. Their relationship was a very, very strange thing. As long as the two had known each other, they had been archrivals, or frenemies, for lack of a proper word. Although it was true that they appeared to genuinely hate one another on the outside, Cartman held silent respect for Kyle's fighting spirit, while Kyle frequently had to admit to himself that the fatass did have some redeeming qualities that made it worthwhile to have him around.

But what was there to say in this kind of situation? What words could you use to express comfort in the midst of a zombie apocalypse to somebody who you actually care about, but want to maintain a facade of uncaring towards? The fact that he actually cared for Kyle was one that Cartman had already come to terms to years ago, albeit grudgingly, but actually admitting it to Kyle upfront was a different matter altogether. Then, Cartman's thoughts flashed back to just a few minutes ago, when Kenny had broken his seething silence and settled for swearing under his breath about how he had failed them all back in the mansion. He looked back at Kyle and Stan, watching as Kyle stared down at his best friend, lips trembling and eyes tearing in an unmistakably mournful expression.

Was the Jew actually blaming himself for what happened?

"It wasn't your fault, Kyle."

Kyle's wet eyes shot upwards, seemingly just realising that Cartman had not left the room, but was actually talking to him.

"What?"

"What happened back in Token's house...wasn't your fault. I don't think you could have done anything about Stan getting injured back there."

"Cartman..."

"No, Jew, listen to me. You're getting that annoying guilty look on your face and it looks so ugly on your Jew mug that its starting to bother the hell out of me. It was the first time we saw that kind of zombie, Kyle. We had no idea what the thing was capable of, or that it would start screaming and run after us. We've never been in that situation before, and we all panicked and split up. If anybody is to blame for Stan's injuries, we all share part of that blame."

Kyle was nearly stunned to silence by Cartman's words. The fat boy had tried to fool them many times before, but there was just something in his tone that made Kyle believe that he actually meant what he was saying. He honestly never thought he'd see the day where Eric Cartman would be heartfelt about anything at all. Apparently, all it had taken was a zombie apocalypse to bring out that side of him.

"The thing is...we're in middle of a real-life zombie apocalypse. Unpredictable things are going to happen, whether we like it or not. The moment we start to blame or doubt ourselves for something that went wrong, we'll start to fall apart. All of us need to be in perfect condition if we're to all survive, and that's not going to work if you're sitting there feeling guilty about something that has already happened."

Kyle bit his lip and looked down at his fingers. Cartman hadn't exactly hit the nail on the head with regards to his lacklustre demeanour, but that didn't mean that there wasn't any truth in what he was saying.

"I was so terrified that I shut myself away from everyone else in a random room and had to fend off against another Hunter, Cartman. That was really, really stupid of me. A little later and I might have been too late to help you."

"Well, _I _was so careless that I shot at a zombie that I had never seen before, the same mistake of Stan's that I freaking _replicated like a moron_, only to be covered in some vile shit that attracted the damned things and blinded me. I would think that was a pretty big mistake too."

"And I said so much stuff to you guys about sticking together, trying to be some kind of leader, only to fall apart in the face of danger and actually _yell_ for everyone to run, essentially splitting us up, which was the _best possible decision_ I could have made, wasn't it?"

Both boys' heads turned to the open doorway to see Kenny, leaning against the doorframe with an expression that indicated that persistent hammering and swearing had at least gotten some of the funk out of his system. Witty sarcasm was the blonde boy's way of saying that he was okay, after all. The look on his face was almost calm, right before it morphed into an almost cheeky grin.

"I didn't mean to interrupt your sweet heart-to-heart talk-"

"Aw, fuck you, Kenny!"

"-but our lovable fatass is right, Kyle. There's no point in trying to pinpoint blame...all we can do is to brush off our injuries and continue to try and fight to survive."

Kyle looked at his friends and gave them a small smile, all whilst silently agreeing with himself to not tell them of the true horror that he had faced back in the mansion, for the sake of not breaking their morale. An image of Token's zombie flashed in his head, and Kyle hastened to block it out, inwardly shuddering. Kyle figured that telling Kenny and Cartman that one of their old friends was not only dead, but was finished off with his own hands, was relatively mood-dampening subject material for a conversation in any context. There would be time to tell them of Token's transformation and subsequent permanent demise _after_ they had reached an area of relative safety.

They could only pray that Denver was still okay.

"Is Stan okay, Kyle?"

"He's fine, Kenny. He lost some blood, but not enough for it to actually be life-threatening. He'll be fine in about half a day."

"Good job patching him up, then. I think we did some nice work turning this place into a makeshift safe-house, but to be safe I think we should take shifts to keep watch from the 2nd floor to make sure that nothing too bad approaches us. The rest of us not on watch could get something to eat from the kitchen and get some rest. We'll exclude Stan from the schedule, because he's still pretty hurt. Cartman, could you take first watch? I'll take over from you in about two hours, and Kyle can take over for me after that."

"Alright fine, bossy po'boy. I'm doing this because I wanna survive, not because I like you or anything."

"Love you too, fatass."

"Before I go up...I'm pretty damn sure they stock shotgun rounds in a gun shop, right? I'm almost all out from my earlier encounter with that fat bastard and his friends."

* * *

><p>"Do you see him in your sights?"<p>

Kyle readjusted his grip on the nice new hunting rifle that Kenny had picked out from Jimbo's stores, feeling somewhat sweaty despite the fact that none of them were in any actual danger at that point of time. Kyle's watch shift had just started, and instead of heading downstairs immediately to grab a bite or a snooze, Kenny had offered to stay behind for a few minutes to show him how to use a weapon which he always assumed required a high level of technical handling ability. Kenny was adamant to prove otherwise.

"Don't be nervous, we're not in any danger. Just focus on the center of the crosshairs and align the rifle to target one of the staggered zombies outside."

Kenny was proving to be a surprisingly good teacher. The two boys were lying flat against the ground, the rifle's butt pressed firmly up against Kyle's shoulder, it's position occasionally tweaked by Kenny whenever it started to slip off Kyle's unfamiliar grip. Kyle's body was, however, tense. What really made Kyle worried was not the fact that he was handling something dangerous, but that Kenny had placed a loaded magazine clip of five live rounds into the rifle's magazine holster before going through the processes of preparing a rifle for firing (checking the magazine was properly inserted, cocking the charging handle, putting on the safety, aiming down the sights) with Kyle. The fact that a single round, designed to kill with extreme precision and power, was currently chambered in the weapon in his hands was a very scary feeling indeed.

"This rifle's a bolt-action rifle, which means you won't be able to keep squeezing the trigger like in most action movies. After every pull of the trigger, you'll need to cock the rifle again to chamber another round."

"Okay Kenny."

"Okay, when you're ready, just uncheck the safety, remember what I said about shooting fundamentals, and fire at one of the guys outside."

Kyle breath caught in his throat at Kenny's words. He had known that this was coming. Kenny meant well, after all. Kyle knew that Kenny wanted to ensure that he would be able to use the weapon in a situation where he absolutely had no say on the matter. Although Kyle had more than proven his capabilities back in Token's mansion, Kenny probably figured that a little target practice wouldn't hurt.

Kyle, however, had another say on that matter.

"No."

Kenny quirked an eyebrow, not in anger, but in confusion.

"No?"

"No, Kenny. We've been through this before. I'm not shooting something if it isn't attacking us, dead or otherwise."

Kenny rolled his eyes in exasperation, releasing his hand from Kyle's shoulder and sitting back up in an upright, cross-legged position. Kyle looked away from the scope up at his friend, involuntarily looking like a puppy who was preparing to get chastised.

"This pacifist attitude doesn't matter to the zombies outside, Kyle. They aren't going to stop chewing you up just because you're a nice guy."

"It doesn't matter, Kenny. They're not alive, but they're not hurting us either."

"Well their friends are! Besides, you've already killed some, haven't you, Kyle? I heard what you told Cartman about the hunter back in Token's place, and when we met after being split up back there I saw you and Cartman running away from what appeared to be a lot of them. You're the one who set the place on fire to kill them all, weren't you? Cartman's brutally smart, but he's not as quick a thinker as you are. You've already killed some, Kyle...what's the big deal?"

"The big deal, Kenny, is that I killed all those out of necessity! They attacked us first, so I fought back! Do you think I _liked_ seeing burning corpses? God, Ken...how the fuck do you not understand where I'm coming from? Those things...those things wandering aimlessly about...they fucking used to be like us, dammit!"

Kyle didn't know at what point during his angry rant had he abruptly stood from where he had been lying down, but he suddenly found himself looking down at an unreadable Kenny, fists clenched in barely restrained frustration and fury. The hunting rifle lay on the side of his feet, toppled over and abandoned. Swearing under his breath for letting his emotions get out of control, Kyle turned away from his friend to hide the tears pooling in his eyes. The events of the past few days had forced Kyle to keep his emotions under wraps, and now that they were in a relatively safe situation, it appeared that Kenny's harsh words had been the trigger for those emotions to be let loose.

Kenny bent over to ensure that the safety on the rifle was still on before slowly standing from where he sat, breathing a sigh of relief. He knew that Kyle had strength deep within him, but there was still no doubt in his mind that his Jewish friend was the most emotionally unstable out of all of them. And if there was one thing he learned from years of living in a messed up household with fucked up parents, it was that a good cry could do wonders for a disturbed mind.

Kyle still stood with his back facing him, biting his lips to restrain his tears.

Taking a cautious step forwards, Kenny then enveloped Kyle in his arms and pulled him into his chest with unexpected tenderness.. Gasping in surprise, Kyle looked up into his slightly taller friend's eyes. Kenny merely shrugged before speaking softly in a comforting tone.

"I know Stan's usually the one who does this for you, but since he's still resting downstairs...I'll guess you'll have to make do with me, Kyle."

For the first time in a long time, Kyle cried like a baby, thoroughly soaking the front of Kenny's parka as he clenched his friend's jacket in impassioned agony. Kenny stood still, resting his chin on Kyle head and rubbing his hair through his green ushanka as his friend cried his eyes out, standing there for him as a stoic pillar of strength. Neither of the two noticed Cartman poke his head into the attic, attention attracted by Kyle's earlier yelling, before retreating back to the first floor without a word.

He had promised Kyle that he wouldn't make fun of him for crying, after all.

* * *

><p>They had had a nice short break away from the horrors of South Park, including actual sleep and proper food that Jimbo and Ned had presumably left behind before they headed towards the airport, but it was about time for the team of four to set off on their way again. Stan, brushing aside concerns from his friends about his wellbeing, very smartly pointed out that the sooner they were in Denver, the better chance they had to survive, a notion that Kenny immediately agreed with.<p>

After stocking their bag packs full of food and water, necessities that were hard to come by considering how nearly every household they had passed by was already cleaned out by survivors upon getting news that there was a zombie infestation right there in their town, the four headed into Jimbo's Guns' backroom, where they ran their eyes over the veritable smorgasbord of firearms, ammunition and melee weapons suitable for taking down giant grizzly bears, let alone the undead. Stan never thought that he'd ever see the day where he actually was thankful for his uncle's unhealthy obsession with things that went boom.

As they took their time to go through the shelves, Kyle continued talking, reciting what he had remembered from Mephesto's notes back in the laboratory. Cartman had always poked fun of the Jew for being nerdy, but right at that moment, as he listened to Kyle ramble on about potential life-saving information about their enemies, he actually appreciated the fact that his rival had an eidetic memory.

"Carman, the fat zombie that you saw just now was probably what Mephesto called a Boomer. It had little to no offensive ability, but it's main method of attack is via vomiting large amounts of bile that it has stored in its belly. Of course, shooting a Boomer when it's close to you will shower you with the bile as well."

"Fuck...don't remind me."

"The bile is not toxic, but it emits a strong smell that works like zombie pheromones, thereby attracting other infected to the area. So our best method to take care of those things if we see them again is to spot and shoot them from afar."

Kyle paused in his commentary to look at a row of neatly arranged Magnum handguns. He wasn't very physically strong, which made the other choices of weapons, like assault rifles and shotguns, merely heavy objects that would encumber him.

"You guys know about the hunter already, so I won't talk about that anymore. The female zombie we saw just now was actually called a witch, and of course its weapons are the long, sharp mutated fingers on its hands. I don't know what Mephesto was thinking, but apparently he made this zombie abnormally thick skin, decreasing the effectiveness of nearly all weapons."

Stan remembered the feeling of the witch's nails on his back and shuddered visibly.

"So what's the best way to take care of them?"

"Mephesto wrote that there were flaws with his creation of this zombie, and it didn't actually attack until startled or provoked. So...I would assume the best way to deal with them if we see them is to just avoid them altogether. And if we do startle one again...just empty our magazines into it, I guess."

"I like the sound of that."

"You like the sound of anything that involves killing things and meaningless bloodshed, Cartman."

"You're such a pussy, Kyle."

"Ignoring the fatass...there're a few other zombies that we apparently haven't encountered yet, like the Smoker, which constantly emits smoke and uses an unnaturally long tongue that is actually its intestines to ensnarl people..."

"That's fucking disgusting."

"There's the jockey, which is a small zombie that hides in dark places and jumps on your back to steer you away. Kind of like an annoying back-humper..."

"Dude."

"The spitter, which vomits and sprays stomach acid which, unlike the boomer's, is actually highly corrosive."

"I think I'm going to puke myself."

"And the charger, which is the most physically strong of the lot. It's designed to run at abnormally fast speeds to bowl people over, and once it has someone in its grasp, it smashes them on the ground repeatedly."

"Mephesto was seriously mentally ill."

"That's all I managed to read in that short amount of time. I don't know if he made anything else, but just to be safe we should be prepared for anything. That wire goes over there, Kenny."

Kenny, who was affixing some device at the workbench, looked up in surprise when Kyle reached over, unplugged one of the wires in his makeshift weapon, and replugged it into a completely different opening before making a few additional adjustments. A loud beep indicated that the device was properly armed and ready to be used. Kenny's eyes widened and turned his entire body to face Kyle, stupefied.

"I learnt how to make pipe bombs because of my dad...but how the heck did you know what to do with that?"

Kyle shrugged.

"The circuit didn't look right from an engineering standpoint. I just completed it."

Kenny shook his head in bemusement and awe.

"Sometimes...I forget just how smart you are, Kyle."

Kyle blushed a little at the compliment.

Fifteen minutes later, the four were ready and armed to the teeth. All of them had some soft body armour that Jimbo had stocked up with for whatever reason, and Kenny had made them each a few pipe bombs in case of emergencies. Kyle, of course, had his duo of handguns, the only difference being the fact that he had swapped out one of his Desert Eagles for a nice Magnum revolver, which Kenny had told him was easily the most powerful handgun being produced commercially in the world. Cartman had swapped out his old shotgun for a newer model with a collapsible stock and a saddle for extra ammunition, which would presumably aid him in getting past the cumbersome reloading mechanism of the powerful gun.

Stan had a menacing looking submachine gun (Kenny said it was an FN P90, which was way too technical for him to actually care about), which would supposedly be most useful when taking down large hoards due to its high fire rate, and his old AK-47 for raw power. Lastly, Kenny had his previously engineered FN SCAR scope-hybrid in his arms, a Magnum in his pants pocket, and a professional sniper rifle strapped on his back. It was only appropriate that the most gun-familiar of all of them would be the one to take down zombies from long distances.

Cartman spoke first, his voice shaking with excitement.

"Don't burst my bubble here...but now I can't help but feel that we can do anything."

No one bothered to contradict him, the other three boys having similar thoughts as they took in the impressive sight of each other and themselves individually laden with dangerous weaponry. If they were a few years younger, they might have cheered at the fact that they would get the chance to become professional badasses, but they were almost adults now. And with age came the serious weight of personal and group responsibility. They were heavily armed, but that didn't change the fact that they were still in a dangerous situation.

As Cartman dismantled the last remnants of the wooden planks they had used earlier to barricade the doors, they could only pray that what they faced from that point on wouldn't match their earlier zombie encounter back in the Blacks' mansion in sheer horribleness.

Of course, they were dead wrong.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note<strong> - This was a bit of a pain to write, but if I seriously wrote chapter after chapter of action scenes, I wouldn't be able to forgive myself. Didn't really expect this chapter to turn out the longest thus far, either. Just a note that guns like the FN P90 and the FN SCAR are actual, real-life guns, some of which have their equivalents in the Left 4 Dead 2 game. Check them out if you wish.

Reviews Appreciated.

~SUITELIFEFAN


	6. Chapter 5

**They Left Four Dying - Chapter 5**

There was something wrong.

To state that something was "wrong" in the midst of the hell that had rained upon their little mountain town within 72 hours was moot, but the anomaly amidst the chaos in front of them stood out glaringly in Stan's sharp eyes. As he lowered his AK-47 assault rifle to better identify the fresh new challenger that stood a short distance away from them, a strong sense of trepidation arose in the depths of the adrenaline coursing through his veins. He vaguely remembered something that Kyle had said back in Jimbo's Guns.

"OI! STAN! WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING!"

The violent shout shook Stan out of his dumbfounded analysis, and he narrowly avoided getting grazed by a few dirty dead hands. The earlier experience of being clawed at by a she-devil had struck a thunderous chord in Stan's heart, and he felt as though he were running on pure adrenaline whenever he heard the gasping sounds of zombies coming from afar, the slightest sight or sound of something abnormal triggering an unnaturally animalistic sixth sense in the boy. It was his body's way of protecting him by revving him up to fight at a hundred percent body-engine capacity, and as Stan sent deadly rounds flying into heads with stunning accuracy, he silently thanked the wounds that had been inflicted on him (before taking it back. Getting sliced by claws seriously hurt like a bitch.)

Cartman didn't pause his unbroken bursts of shotgun rounds despite his angry outburst, his trigger-happy fingers beating out slugs of buckshot at the horde of infected at a constant, vehement rhythm. His new shotgun, as everyone could tell from the smoke that was occasionally rising up from its side, was getting quite a workout. There was no denying that Cartman had a little bit of gun-lust, but this time, in the midst of a hoard of zombie-wild-game, even Kyle wasn't complaining. He had gotten used to the reloading mechanism of his shotgun, and slid fresh shells into the weapon at almost twice the speed than he had done before.

Standing directly behind him was Kenny, the hood of his orange parka off his head as he wielded the sniper rifle like he was born to brandish the weapon, firing alarmingly accurate shots and blowing up heads into the seemingly endless horde that ran hungrily towards the group. No one bothered to mention that sniper rifles weren't exactly designed to be used at short range since Kenny had proven that he was more than capable of firing them at the hip, the rifle pressed against his side. When coupled with Kenny's semi-automatic in his other hand, the guns made the skilful dirty-blonde boy practically invincible.

Finally, there was Kyle. Sweet, once-wouldn't-hurt-a-fly Kyle who gripped on tightly to a duo of handguns, a mortified look plastered on his face as though the pistols were burning his skin. Twenty-four hours ago, the rest in their group would have attributed this to weakness, but as all of them had a chance to test out the insane recoil when firing with a Magnum variant that Kenny had called "the most powerful handgun in the world", they already knew that it was a massive undertaking to fire it with two hands, let alone one. Even Cartman had to admit (after firing Kyle's handgun once and nearly falling over in shock as the gun jumped itself out of his hand) that Kyle was stronger than he looked.

There didn't seem to be anyone else, aside from the four fighting warriors, still alive in the whole of South Park.

Realising that a couple of infected were getting alarmingly close, Stan growled as he shoved his rifle outwards, pushing a group of three infected that had reached his front to the ground. Finishing two off with a shower of rounds, he drove his rifle butt downwards into the skull of the third, a satisfying squelch filling the air as the zombie's corrupted brains collapsed inwards. Just as Stan was about to look upwards for the unknown infected again, something happened that made his blood run cold with fear and alarm.

The unusual zombie opened its mouth and whipped out a tongue that seemed far too long to fit in its mouth in the direction of the group of four. The fifth appendage traveled at such an alarming speed that Stan didn't have any time to react, the course of action hindered further by the absurdity of the zombie's attack. The tongue hit its mark and rapidly moved like a snake, wrapping around its target's torso and ensnarling his arms. Kyle screamed bloody murder as the zombie retracted its tongue, dragging him against the hard ground in its direction, his guns still clutched tightly in his hands, but unable to be used for aiming and firing at whatever was trying to kidnap him.

"WHAT THE FUCK!"

Stan's eyes were bulging out of their sockets.

"Shit! Kyle!"

Making a mad dash away from Cartman and Kenny who were still busy fending off the horde of infected, Stan simultaneously raised his rifle in the direction of the mutated zombie, ready to put it out like a light. As he pushed firmly against the trigger, he heard a hollow 'click', the empty rifle's chamber echoing with morbid finality.

"Fuck…FUCK!"

The tongue was dragging Kyle away at a speed that was frighteningly fast, Stan's movement also hindered by the abundance of corpses strewn at his feet. Gritting his teeth as he imagined a fresh batch of raw adrenaline flooding through his veins, Stan picked up the pace, somehow ignoring the lactic acid buildup in his tired legs. As he gained on his struggling best friend, who was visibly wincing at contact with the hard ground, Stan unstrapped a machete that he had picked up earlier from his side, swiping the blade in a single arc above Kyle's head, the tongue giving way and sending Kyle crashing into the ground writhing in pain and shock.

He wasn't done yet.

In retrospect, Stan could have easily realised that without a tongue to lasso people with, the zombie was practically defenceless and was no longer worth his time. However, an unfamiliar bloodlust and rage filled his bones, aided by the thought that Kyle had nearly been captured by one of the disgusting things. Yelling in fury, Stan raced up to the zombie, held his breath to avoid inhaling the strange smoky fumes that surrounded it, and with inhuman speed, sliced its head off with the skill of a master of blades.

That last bit was somewhat exaggerated, but Stan more than deserved it with his outlandish display of heroism.

Kyle sat there on the ground, a little shaken up by the whole thing, his eyes widened from Stan's sudden supposed mastery of the art of machete wielding.

"Shit...thanks, Stan. That was a smoker, I think. The ones with the abnormally long-LOOK OUT!"

Stan reeled back at the sound of Kyle shouting, and yelled out in shock as a tiny zombie hopped onto his back, crawled its way up towards his head, and covered his eyes with its gangly long limbs, its legs tucked under his armpits and rendering his arms unable to move, the machete in his hands falling to the ground. It was a truly terrifying thing, being suddenly ambushed by a jockey, and Kyle's back-humping metaphor from earlier was definitely not helping as Stan shrieked like a girl as the zombie tried to steer him further away from Kyle and into more infected that were coming their way.

Swearing under his breath, Kyle picked himself up from the ground, and quickly realising a potentially fatal mistake before it happened, holstered the Magnum. Even aiming properly and shooting the zombie straddling his friend's back would drive the round clear into Stan's body, possibly killing him. There were sometimes problems with limitless bullet power. Instead, Kyle raised his Desert Eagle, and, all the while knowing that a single misplaced shot could still wound or kill his struggling friend, he took a deep calming breath and lined his dominant eye up with the deadly pistol, forcing his mind to not panic.

He then exhaled slowly, and fired.

The single round drove itself into the zombie's skull and disintegrated upon impact with its corrupted brains, blowing the jockey's head clear off its shoulders and leaving Stan, though showered with zombie brains and blood, otherwise unharmed. Stan shuddered a little as he practically threw the jockey's corpse off him and raced back to Kyle, his legs still a little shaky from the fright he had just experienced.

"God dammit...that was some good aiming, Kyle."

The sound of shotgun popping caught their attention, and the two boys turned around, their eyes meeting Cartman and Kenny, who had finished fighting off the attacking horde and were jogging in their direction, cleaning up the few remaining staggered monsters in front of Stan and Kyle. Cartman was looking a tad out of breath after the attack, and his ammunition pouch looked significantly lighter than it had been before, while Kenny looked practically unaffected as he mumbled for the rest of them to watch his back as he squatted down to dislodge a round that had jammed itself in his FN SCAR assault rifle.

"I saw what happened from the corner of my eye, but Kenny and I were a little busy ourselves. Right after you guys separated from us we got ambushed by another goddamned hunter."

"...Sorry about that."

"Don't apologise, Jew. I don't think any of us expected a whole lot of tongue, and at least we temporarily separated in pairs, so we could look after each other. What the hell was that one, by the way?"

Kyle stood up and kicked at the "tongue" that had captured him, now practically a useless hunk of diseased meat.

"That was the smoker I talked about. It's dangerous...I think it was designed to pick people off and separate them from groups. You guys might have missed it, but Stan got ridden by a jockey immediately after that-"

"It sucks, guys. Really...you don't want to experience what I just did."

"-but I got rid of the thing before he could drive Stan into real danger. If any of us had been isolated...that'd really be the end of us."

"Great. Just…great."

If an artist-in-residence had been stationed in South Park at that point of time just for the sake of capturing images of film-worthy cataclysmic moments, the moment that the four boys were experiencing at that time, with a huge, dramatic backdrop of a sunset, shophouses, Stark's Pond, and countless dead bodies strewn across the ground, would have been the perfect picture for a work titled "Despair". It was clear to all four subjects that they had not expected the sheer craziness of being ambushed every fifteen minutes by a new hoard of zombies, and their facial expressions were expressing said despair perfectly. Kenny, legs tired, ignored the blood on the streets and sat down in the middle of the road, quietly poking at his jammed round with a swiss army knife and not saying a word. Kyle stared at Kenny working, absent-mindedly kicking the severed tongue that had ensnarled him, an expression of frustration painted on his face. Cartman silently placed his fingers into his ammunition pouch and counted his remaining shells, staring down at the ground and looking uncharacteristically lost.

Out of all four of them, Stan easily had the most to be depressed about. The other three boys had sustained minor injuries, but he was the one who had sustained wounds that were potentially life-threatening, and though he had remained quiet about it for the sake of not alarming his friends, every step he had taken from Jimbo's Guns had brought a surprising amount of strain to his already weakened body. Kyle couldn't even tell Stan if any of the wounds that he had stitched up would scar, and the trauma of what had happened was still acting on his mind as flinched at every isolated sound he heard.

However, against all explainable reasons, Stan took in his friend's upset visages, sighed loudly, and spoke.

"Kenny, once you're done with that, we should go. Nightfall's about to come in about an hour or so, and we should find somewhere to stay for the night, preferably some place where we can stock up on food and water. Heads up, guys. I know this is tough, and there are still tons of zombies around wanting to chew us up...but we're all still alive, and we're all still together. That's what matters."

All three boys looked at their abnormally optimistic friend as they let him say his piece.

"We're still quite a distance from Denver, but we're going to take this one step at a time. We already know that there's no other way to do things here in an unpredictable redneck town like this one, and look at us. We're all almost eighteen and we're survived through the impossible together. Mutant guinea pigs, war with Canada, puberty-"

"Ugh."

"This is just...one more adventure. One last adventure that we'll ever have in freaking South Park. I say we do our best to survive through this, and once we hit the expressway we can all flip this damned town the bird together as fucking badasses. What do you say?"

Stan always had an innate ability to convince people of anything, and even in the midst of hell on earth he had proven himself to be a fantastic orator, small smiles already on his friends' faces. Cartman caught himself smiling, then immediately tried to pass it off as an itchy feeling on his nose before snorting halfheartedly.

"That was way too gay, Marsh."

Stan grinned. Saying that something was gay was Cartman's way of saying that he was okay. And based on Kyle's friendly shoulder punch and Kenny rising his feet with renewed vigour, they were fine as well. Kenny clapped a hand on Stan's shoulder before pointing in one direction, momentarily taking back control of the situation for the sake of making a new suggestion.

"The supermarket. We can camp over there for tonight. It's not far away, and though fleeing survivors would probably have raided the shelves already, there still might be some food and water left."

Everyone nodded their heads in agreement, and they set off, refuelled by another successful battle and well-meant words.

* * *

><p>They reached the supermarket barely fifteen minutes before darkness hit South Park. For the first time in a long time, the car park was completely void of vehicles, the seventy-two hours of cataclysm having brought scary desolation to their little town in an instant. The boys found the glass door to the entrance of the supermarket smashed into tiny shards, and after breaking it a little more to allow their largest member to enter the building safely (Kyle couldn't resist making a fat joke, which Cartman cuffed him on the head for in order to substitute for yelling, which might have drawn straggling zombies to them), they lowered their weapons after doing a quick visual scan of the area, breathing a sigh of relief at what looked like a deserted supermarket.<p>

Kenny, however, kept his smallest weapon, his deadly magnum, up. He turned and whispered to his friends.

"This place is huge, unlike Jimbo's Guns. We should physically go and check every corner to make sure nothing's inside."

The three nodded and reequipped their guns.

Suddenly, there was a loud bang from the inside of the supermarket, and the intact glass wall that was directly behind them shattered a split second later, the glass falling towards them as dangerous projectiles. Raising their large guns shielded them from most of the debris, but Kyle and Cartman winced as their skins were pricked by the falling shards. Kenny's eyes widened instantly, and he grabbed Stan, who was standing in front of him, by his shoulder and pulled the indignant boy to the ground, his head spinning to meet Kyle and Cartman's surprised eyes in anxiousness.

"Fucking get down, you two!"

The two looked perplexed, but did as they were told. Kenny's words proved to be pearls of wisdom when barely a second later, a continuous string of desperate shots rang out from the same area, flitting by uncomfortably close to their heads and burying themselves inside the check-out counter that they were hiding behind. The four boys were already accustomed to the sound of their own weapons after three days of fighting vicious monsters, but that was the very first time that any of them had to face down actual guns, and it took the firearm-adjusted ear of Kenny McCormick to instantly recognise that they were taking fire.

"What the fuck...why the fuck is someone shooting at us?!"

"I didn't even know there was anyone else alive besides us-EEP!"

Kyle shrieked girlishly when a round came way too close for comfort and penetrated the area of the counter that was next to his shoulder, Cartman involuntarily placing his hand on Kyle's shoulder and pulling him towards himself to keep him away from the firing, neither Nazi or Jew realising how close they were to each other as Kyle practically buried himself under Cartman's shoulder, whimpering at the close shave.

"Whoever's in there heard us come in, and honestly, everyone who walks in here might as well be a zombie to them."

"What the fuck do we do then?!"

"Only one thing left for us to do, if the guy's panicking and firing indiscriminately. You guys had better start praying that they're not hostile."

"What? Kenny, what the fuck do you-"

Kenny cut Stan off by standing up and shouting as loudly as he could towards the source of the firing, ignoring his friends' fierce hisses and their urgent tugging at his pants leg to get back down into safety.

"Hey! Whoever's in there...we're not zombies, and we're not infected!"

The firing didn't stop, and Kenny winced as a bullet whizzed past his ear, nearly blowing his brains out.

"How the fuck do I know that you're not lying about being infected? Fucking get out of here!"

All four boys stopped short at the sound of the voice. They might not have been perfectly attuned to the sound of gunfire, but that voice, that distinctive, monotonous voice, was one that they had heard as the background to their adolescent soundtrack in way too many occasions to be so easily forgotten. The four boys had lost most friendliness and contact with their childhood friends for a while, but the one who was still the most connected amongst all of them met the owner of said voice nearly weekly on a non-zombified day for football practice. Stan hoisted himself to his feet, shielding Kenny with his own body, and spoke softly but clearly into the sudden silence that had engulfed the supermarket.

"Craig? Is that you?"

There were a few tense seconds of stillness in the air before a lone figure emerged from the shadow-filled supermarket rows, wearing a familiar blue jacket, a slightly askew blue chullo hat with a yellow poof ball on top, and a single pistol clutched firmly in shaking hands. Craig Tucker visibly squinted his eyes and took in the familiar, four-troublemaking sight in front of him, caught sight of his football teammate, and exhaled heavily, lowering the gun and practically collapsing against the shelves.

"Thank God...we thought we were the only ones left."

Kyle and Cartman picked themselves off the ground and all four stepped forward, all feeling relieved at finding someone familiar who was still alive, but also a little disturbed by the bad state that Craig appeared to be in. As they walked closer, they realised that Craig's blue jacket was dirtied with old blood, there was a significantly large bandage wrapped around his right arm, and he wasn't looking bored (which would be typical to Craig), but distressed, evidence that he had also seen much of the horrors that they had encountered on the long path from Mephesto's lab to the South Park supermarket. Stan stepped forward first, being the most familiar with their old classmate.

"Craig...are you okay?"

Craig winced in pain before speaking.

"Yeah...just tired, that's all. Plus one of those fucking asswipe demons got too close, ran straight at me and smashed me into the broken glass wall that you guys probably entered from. I lost more blood than you can imagine...been camping out here for the day."

"That was probably a charger."

"What? Did you say something, Broflovski?"

Kyle visibly paled at being addressed so rudely by their old friend. He had never been particularly close to Craig, but the boy was well-known amongst students in their same grade for being more abrasive with his words and tone than most. Craig's rudeness sparked a loud "EY!" from Cartman, and Kenny stepped forward protectively, growling menacingly at Craig. Stan frowned before glaring at his teammate.

"His name is Kyle, Craig, and you don't have to be so bitchy."

Craig shook his head in exasperation.

"I'm sorry...we've just...it hasn't been the best few days."

All four boys' eyes widened. For Craig to apologise for anything at all was unprecedented. They realised that he must have seen true danger for his personality to shift in such a drastic manner. Kyle then realised something that had blown past their attentions the first time Craig had said it, and he ventured a hesitant question.

"Wait...did you say "we"?"

Right on cue, another person stepped into their row, shaking violently, another handgun seemingly glued to twitchy hands, and the four boys flinched a little as they found themselves staring down the barrel of yet another gun. Craig silently gestured to his companion that it was okay, and as the gun was lowered, the boys spotted long, messy locks of bright blond hair. Cartman instantly groaned as he recognised yet another person from his childhood, and though he had been hoping for somebody who could deal good firepower when needed, it appeared that they were stuck with babysitting somebody who, by his standards, was practically an invalid in the midst of a zombie apocalypse.

The boy blinked quickly as he took hesitant steps towards them. Kyle gasped as he recognised one of his few friends from outside of their group of four, and raced forward to wrap him in a tight embrace, the boy who was even shorter than Kyle yelping a little at the sudden contact, but quickly melting into the hug, biting back tears.

"Tweek...thank fucking God you're okay!"

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note<strong> - Transitional chapter, which is inevitable for a fic where most of the scenes involve gun firing and my wild imagination. I was debating with myself about bringing auxiliary characters into the mix, but I figured it'd probably a good idea, as there's only so much descriptions that I can milk out of Stan, Kyle, Kenny and Cartman. How these characters will eventually be used still remains to be seen, but I'm formulating fresh plots as we go about this, so hopefully I'll be able to juggle two more popular South Park characters.

Reviews Appreciated.

~SUITELIFEFAN


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